


The Chaos of His Mind

by grammarpolice



Category: Prodigal Son (TV 2019)
Genre: (with possible sequel), Ambiguous/Open Ending, Angst, Blood, Blood and Gore, Childhood Trauma, Father-Son Relationship, Gen, Guilt, Gunshot Wounds, Malcolm Bright Needs a Hug, Malcolm Bright Whump, Men Crying, Whump, references to trauma
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-27
Updated: 2019-11-27
Packaged: 2021-02-26 23:47:13
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,277
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21577696
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/grammarpolice/pseuds/grammarpolice
Summary: cha·os (n)complete disorder and confusion.
Relationships: Gil Arroyo & Malcolm Bright
Comments: 30
Kudos: 107





	The Chaos of His Mind

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Shameful_Indulgence](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Shameful_Indulgence/gifts), [Iforgotmyformerusername](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Iforgotmyformerusername/gifts).



It’s the chaos of his mind, like colossal soldiers battling in muddied trenches. They stand on two fronts, blood-stained blades clutched in one hand, the other pitching flags that soar on wavelengths of unresolved memories and childhood traumas.

“Like a war,” his therapist used to say. “It’s a fight for power. The bad side wants sadness to win, and the good side wants happiness to win. You have to let the good side win, Malcolm.”

He remembers being ten, sitting across the woman on a big blue couch, fingertips toying with a mind-teaser he’d found resting on the glass tabletop. “How?” he’d asked.

He still doesn’t know.

The dark side rises in bouts of hyperactive tremors and infernal nightmares. It comes in the form of self-inflicted restraints that constrict around his wrist and daytime hallucinations. It’s the woman with pallor rolls of skin crammed into the vintage trunk in his father’s old station wagon, and the shackles he wears in lieu of light.

If anything, though, the dark side feels a lot like getting shot again.

The air in his lungs thins and he sputters, coughs, chokes on the metallic taste that crawls up his throat. It’s hot, almost too hot, licking against his skin like the tongue of a hellhound. For a moment he thinks he may throw up; he swallows down the sensation of revolting bile, grimacing as it slithers down his esophagus and leaves an acidic trail in its wake.

The bullet is nestled beneath his left ribcage, pressing against fragments of shredded flesh and torn muscle tissue. He’s numb in a way he’s never been before as if his body’s been glazed in ice then skewered by a white-hot iron rod. The sensation expands like a single drop of blood in a tub full of water: lithe, indomitable, and untouchable.

A nine-millimeter bullet thrusts from the muzzle of a pistol at a speed of nine hundred miles per hour. Upon impact, the gathered momentum sends initial shockwaves through the body, the power of its velocity posing risk to surrounding organs. However, the likelihood of surviving a gun-inflicted wound depends substantially on the trajectory and pathway the perpetrator adopts. Ninety percent of casualties stem from a significant amount of blood loss, and —

Fuck.

There’s a lot of fucking blood soaking through his shirt.

The fabric clings to his flesh, swallowed by the abrasion, the liquid tainting it cold in the evening air. It’s heavy against his chest like the army of the dark side, looming and mammoth and never-ending. His mother will be mad, he thinks. The suit costs eight hundred dollars.

It’s almost comical and so fucking typical that while his life bleeds out onto the concrete beneath him all he can think about is what _Mother_ will think. He supposes it’s understandable, though; she's always taken priority over her children.

His phone vibrates beneath his thigh. It sends jitters through his body, agitating his wound, and he winces. Still, he’s not in as much pain as he'd imagined someone shot in the chest would experience. Instead, he feels numb, detached, like his consciousness is slipping away, tumbling further and further into an abyss. In a way, though, he’s been watching his grip on life falter since he was a child. He’s seen his sanity fracture, felt his shrieks tear the strings of his vocal cords one by one, seen his subconscious revive the girl in the box solely to haunt him. 

With a grunt, he flexes his legs, pushing his abdomen up. A scream fills the air and it takes him a moment too long to realize it’s coming from his own mouth. He bites down on his lips, teeth sinking into raw skin, and the sound muffles to a whine; he fishes the phone from his pocket, then gently releases the pressure from his thighs, lowering himself back onto the blood-stained concrete.

The device reads one percent. He’d thought it was dead. The top notification is from Gil, and although Malcolm knows that he should call for help, that he’ll die if he doesn’t reach a hospital, he wants nothing more than to hear the man’s voice. With shaking fingers he punches in his password, clicks on the notification, and presses play.

“Hey, kid,” Gil says, tone gruff and low. In the background, the sounds of the precinct— incoherent chatter and the beeping of decelerating machines— fills the emptiness. “I just…,” he pauses for a moment, takes a breath, then continues, “I’m sorry about earlier… about what I said. I didn’t— you’re nothing like him, and I-I shouldn’t have… I shouldn’t have even....” Another pause. “Look, it just worries me when you don’t listen to me because I don’t want anything to happen to you. I don’t know what I would do if…." He takes a long inhale. “Anyway, I wanted to get a chance to talk to you in person but you were gone by the time I finished up that interrogation. I, uh, I’m sorry about that, too. Please call me back when you get this. I get if you’re upset—trust me, I’d be—but I just want to know that you’re okay.... All right, uh, I’ll talk to you tomorrow.” He’s quiet for a beat, then adds, “ Oh, and for the love of God, Malcolm, get some sleep.”

The line goes dead.

For a moment, the familiarity of Gil’s voice alleviates the tightness in Malcolm’s chest like the feeling of hot coals lodged deep beneath his ribs falters, the blood pouring onto his flesh clots, the sensation of a stray bullet wriggling against tattered muscle tissue dissipates. And, despite being the sole occupant of the narrow alleyway, he doesn’t feel like he’s dying alone.

He wonders if calling for emergency services means the dark side wins. If he does, he'll realistically be dead by the time help arrives anyway, and Gil will be forced to wear the chains of guilt for the rest of his life. Malcolm would rather bleed out than have the man bare even a fraction of the weight he wears around his neck like a collar.

His therapist had said, “You have to let the good side win, Malcolm.”

“How?” he’d asked.

She’d thought for a moment. “That’s something you’ll have to figure out. You’ll know when the time comes.”

With the last breaths of his phone, Malcolm selects Gil’s contact. It goes straight to voicemail.

“Hi… Hi Gil.” His voice quivers in time with the pulsation of his heart. “I know y-you didn’t mean what you said. A-and I’m sorry, too.... You’re right, th-though. I didn’t listen to you and now I’m b-bleeding out on the concrete in some sketchy alley.” He almost fucking laughs because everything in his body has gone numb and all he wants is for Gil to be here, to make things better, to take him home, and chain him to the restraints, and offer to sleep on the couch because he doesn’t want Malcolm to be alone, but instead the latter is dying on the cold ground that’s soaked with his own blood, talking to a recording that may never send. “I want you to know that i-it’s not your fault, and that—”

The screen goes black.

A knot strangulates the lining of Malcolm’s airway. He wants to scream, to rip the bullet from his flesh with his own teeth, to punch the concrete until his knuckles bleed, but most of all he just wants to cry.

And he does.

He sobs alone on the concrete, tears and blood spilling from his body in unison, because, in the chaos of his mind, the dark side always wins.

**Author's Note:**

> sorry this is so angsty! 
> 
> first i wanna say that i was blown away by the amount of love on my last fic. i wasn't expecting that as ps is such a new tv show. so thank you! 
> 
> anyway, i'm not too happy with this but thought i'd share in case anyone can get some enjoyment out of it (it's really weird to say "enjoyment" for whump, but it's true!!) 
> 
> (@ shameful_indulgence and @ iforgotmyformerusername (that's a really funny name by the way): i'm not sure if this is quite what you imagined, and if it's not i'm sorry for that. i'm happy to add a sequel with comfort if that's what you're into. again, i'm really really sorry if this wasn't what you were looking for - i had begun writing this and thought i'd try and stick your prompt in). 
> 
> sorry if it's out of character, still trying to learn them! 
> 
> thanks for reading <3


End file.
